In a widely reported story, Apple's iPod will be given to all Duke University freshman this fall.
The handheld computers will be loaded with course materials, lecture notes, and other university-related materials. While at Virginia Tech, I was involved with freshman orientation (providing information on university computers and networks), and I can tell you the incoming students get an enormous stack of paper, most of which is probably never read.
Someone probably did the math on the cost of duplicating what is certainly hundreds of thousands of pages of materials and the related cost of shipping, storing, organizing, collating, and distributing it. My guess is it came within a few bucks of buying iPods in bulk and putting all that stuff on them (it would take about 15 seconds over Firewire to load them).
One of the neat uses for an iPod in a university environment would be to provide audio tours for new students--how to use the library, how to find the dining hall, how to add and drop classes.....all sorts of stuff that students could quickly dial up and listen to.
My guess also is that they are shifting the cost of printing course materials to the students as well. Instead of printing class notes and lecture materials, they are preloading the files on the iPod, and students choose to print them, or not. It could be that Duke discovered they were actually saving money by giving out the handheld computers.
Of course, they also store and play music, which virtually guarantees that students will use them. It's a brilliant and innovative concept.